How does it feel to attend and be nominated at the Grammys?
It is very wild. In my wildest dreams, I never thought I would end up there. And it was really fun. I feel like I went in with a pretty good attitude. For me, it’s been such an honor to be a part of that prestigious conversation that I’m totally okay with losing. I am really happy to be there. One thing that’s really cool about the Grammys is that 50% of the shows are just crazy performances of such a high caliber. It was a really enjoyable experience that I don’t know if I’ll ever have it again. And I felt like, I knew I was going to lose these two awards.
With that, I wanted to ask you how important yellow is to you as it’s clearly featured in your album covers and Grammy images, and I see your walls are yellow too.
Yes, I went through a big yellow period. I think so Jubilee was the first album that I started thinking about [it] in the context of my cosmology. Album cover for Psychopomp Is this some kind of melancholy blue and Softly sound like a red and dark, moody color. I knew very early on that the album would be called Jubilee and the theme will be this very extensive fun exploration. I feel like yellow is the funniest color. It also featured on X-Men Jubilee, the character. I also feel weird like there’s an element of reclaiming being Asian in a way.
I knew that I was going to be wearing a yellow dress, that there would be kind of a warmer yellow tone for the album cover and that during the cycle my subject would be wearing a lot of yellow, which proved to be more difficult. I think a lot. A lot of designers don’t really make too much yellow. So it’s really limited for a while. And then when I saw that Valentino dress, I felt like, oh, it has to be. [It’s] a perfect combination of something very vibrant and yellow, feeling goofy and weird but also very classy.
I love it. And I also love your beauty. Did you have a hand to figure that out? How did that come together?
I feel like I’m still really learning how to navigate that world. Hair and makeup are still a luxury. I always thought [with] hair and makeup, people come up with all these ideas. And then the day comes, they say, “Okay, so what do you want to do?” And how I was, I don’t know. I started collecting more looks because I realized that it’s really my job. Therefore French Alexandra I put on makeup, and she’s working Happiness. I know that I’m in really good hands. We just decided to go with a yellow-highlight eyeliner to go with the outfit.
Preston Wada did my hair. And I knew I wanted really long braids because one of the first lyrics on the record was “untie a great knot and it’ll come out like a braid.” So I also did a lot of braids because that kind of looks like the thesis for the profile. I also braided my hair on the album cover, so we wanted to remember all the things that we set out for the cycle.
